U.S. weighs ending contacts with Arafat

Ongoing attacks troubling Bush

WASHINGTON — Angered by Palestinian stonewalling over an attempt to smuggle a boatload of Iranian arms and exasperated by continued terror attacks against Israel, the Bush administration is weighing whether to break off diplomatic contacts with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and label him a supporter of terrorism.

President Bush said Friday that he was "very disappointed" with Arafat, who has been unable or unwilling to stop Arab militants from committing suicide bombings and other terrorist acts against Israeli citizens.

American and Israeli officials also say they have evidence that senior Palestinian officials orchestrated the 50-ton shipment of arms and plastic explosives from Iran that Israel intercepted at sea Jan. 3. Arafat has denied that he or any of his associates were involved.

"Ordering up weapons that were intercepted on a boat headed for that part of the world is not part of fighting terror, that's enhancing terror," Bush said during a trip to Maine to give a speech on homeland security.

White House aides said Bush's national security advisers debated Friday how to respond to the current cycle of retaliatory violence in the Middle East. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the United States has "a full range of options available to us of a political and diplomatic nature."

In the latest violence Friday, a Palestinian suicide bomber in Tel Aviv set off a bolt-studded bomb in a pedestrian mall, killing himself and wounding 29 bystanders. The bombing followed an Israeli missile attack Thursday night that killed a senior Islamic militant.

Breaking off relations with Arafat would constitute a profound rupture in the already tattered 1993 Oslo peace process for which Arafat shared the Nobel Peace Prize. The U.S. is pulling back from direct peace efforts.

Powell has declined to send his special Middle East envoy, retired Marine Corps Gen. Anthony Zinni, back to the region to resume mediation efforts. Since Zinni's last visit, at the beginning of January, a cease-fire declared by Arafat in mid-December has collapsed in a fresh cycle of attacks and reprisals.

Since the Palestinians resumed their uprising against Israel 16 months ago, more than 900 Palestinians and more than 250 Israelis have been killed.

As the administration contemplated freezing out Arafat, Bush invited Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to the White House on Feb. 7. The meeting will mark Sharon's fourth White House visit to see Bush; Arafat has never been invited.

U.S. `appalled,' `outraged'

"The United States is appalled at the involvement of senior Palestinian Authority officials in [the] ... smuggling operation," White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said. "And we're outraged by the role played by Iran and Hezbollah in that operation and in the support they gave to international terrorism and in their opposition to Middle East peace."

The administration has strongly endorsed Israel's right to defend itself against terrorist attacks and Sharon's decision to confine Arafat to his compound in the West Bank city of Ramallah inside a ring of tanks.

Meanwhile, a series of provocative actions by the Israelis, including targeted killings of Palestinian militants and repeated military sweeps into Palestinian areas, have drawn only muted U.S. criticism.

"Largely the Israelis have been reacting to the violence that's occurred from terrorist groups on the Palestinian side," a senior State Department official said. "If those groups were effectively stopped, then Israel would have no cause for the kind of actions that it has been taking."

But Mideast analysts with long diplomatic experience in the region are concerned that the American reluctance to directly mediate the conflict, combined with the administration's decision not to censure Israeli and Palestinian excesses in equal measure, will doom the two sides to unceasing carnage.

"I don't see any prospect for improvement," said Hasan Abu-Nimah, the former Jordanian representative to the United Nations who helped mediate peace agreements between the Israelis and Palestinians. "I see a firm endorsement of the Israeli position. Every time the Palestinians observe a cease-fire, the Israelis stage an assassination. This duel is not leading anywhere except escalating violence. It's a very grim and bleak outlook."

Calls for investigation

Anger over the arms smuggling has been building inside the Bush administration for weeks as Arafat has rebuffed repeated U.S. requests to investigate or explain the incident. The ship set off from Iran loaded with weapons on Dec. 12, four days before Arafat, under intense American and Israeli pressure, urged Palestinian militants to observe a cease-fire.